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"We have water lines that date back to the 1800s," said Director of the Department of Public Works Chapin Spencer.

DPW is working on some of those lines, especially at the corner of Main and South Winooski streets, to update the pipes and prevent floods in known hot spots.

Spencer’s been in charge of Burlington’s infrastructure for less than a year. He admitted to WPTZ’s Stephanie Gorin that there are some issues to tackle.

“It’s a mix,” Spencer said, “One: It's an aging infrastructure. Two: There have been times when we have not been investing to the level we need to invest in. And those two things together mean that we have a tall order moving ahead.”

Spencer is trying to move ahead and address problems quickly, to support Mayor Miro Weinberger’s plans for a more modern, walkable city. Spencer said he’ll assess the 96 miles of road and 127 miles of sidewalks. When it comes to sidewalks, he said, “right now we have a long list of sidewalk repairs that we’re not getting to as quickly as we’d like.”

Weinberger’s plan includes bringing more people to live downtown, but that will take more housing. The mayor said, “We need substantially more housing downtown.” He said that includes market-rate housing, or properties bought or rented at what the current market demands with no government subsidies.

The director of Burlington’s Community and Economic Development Office, Peter Owens, said the city has been falling behind when it comes to market-rate properties. “We are way behind in this respect,” Owens said, “We often think of ourselves as a progressive city. We are very regressive in our ability to build market-rate housing over the last 10 years.”

Owens points to strenuous zoning codes and difficult permitting processes in Burlington. He and the mayor agree it is time to streamline the process.

In the meantime, there are more than 130 new housing units, condos, apartments and co-ops under construction right now downtown. That should help improve the vacancy rate which currently stands at 1 percent, and makes it nearly impossible to find an affordable place to live in the downtown core.

A two-year study of Burlington’s future, outlined in a book called Plan BTV, showed approximately 30 spots where new housing could be built, with storefronts on the bottom floors. Owens says this could amount to about 1,000 new housing units. “It will create a much more dynamic, a much more vibrant, a much more walkable environment,” Owens said.

As Owens works on housing, Chapin Spencer is attacking infrastructure.

“We are bullish about reinvesting in our systems. We understand they're aging, we understand they need attention.”

All the changes in the works will take time, but they’re all steps in Mayor Weinberger’s plans to turn Burlington into THE place to live, work and play.

Through our investigation into Burlington’s Big Dig, WPTZ has learned that a new report about downtown housing will be released tomorrow, Thursday May 22, 2014. It will address much of what you will read in the following report, including the need for more market-rate housing in the downtown core. WPTZ will continue to cover Queen City development as it happens.